


Rocket Boots

by WittyWallflower



Category: Eureka (TV), Jupiter Ascending (2015)
Genre: Crack Crossover, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-24
Updated: 2017-02-05
Packaged: 2018-09-19 15:09:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9446942
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WittyWallflower/pseuds/WittyWallflower
Summary: Top secret government technology versus alien technology. Flying boots meet an electromagnetic barrier, and a strange little town is visited by two even stranger guests.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> prompt: JA Eureka crossover. Girls Night Out.

They were coasting over the dense forests of the Pacific Northwest when Jupiter’s boots flickered and went black. She barely had time to feel the sensation of falling before Caine’s arms slipped around her from behind, taking her weight with a swish of his wings. He landed them in a clearing and immediately set to tinkering with their boots. Caine’s boots had cut out at precisely the same time, suggesting something external had caused it rather than a simple malfunction. 

Jack Carter picked his way through the underbrush. This part of the forest had no hiking trails, at least none that he had been able to find. GD sensors had picked up impacts to the electromagnetic barrier. As had been explained to Jack, the EM signal only affected technology so someone had to go and find out what device was responsible. Bring in the Sheriff. 

He spied the strangers through the trees as he approached. He was about to call out to them when the man stood, spinning to face Carter. The man’s eyes seemed to unerringly pick Jack out of the underbrush. The guy was huge and bulky and radiated tension. Jack really hoped he wasn’t going to have to pull out one of those crazy Eureka stun guns. 

Carter slowed his pace and made his footsteps louder as he reached the clearing. after all, he hadn’t been trying to sneak up on them. The man still looked jumpy but the girl beside him seemed unconcerned. Her street clothes didn’t suggest scientific espionage or any other nefarious reasons for showing up in Eureka. Maybe he would get lucky and wouldn’t need to use the cell in the Sheriff’s station today. 

“Howdy, folks.” he raised a hand in greeting and put on the aw-shucks, small-town-sheriff attitude that served him well in disarming people. "Having any trouble out here?”

Caine moved to place himself between Jupiter and the newcomer. The movement wasn’t lost on Carter. He didn’t like having not eyes on the girl, but the protective gesture would seem to imply the big man hadn’t planned to start any violence. They hadn’t come spoiling for a fight at least. 

“No.” was all Caine said, his tone abrupt and warning. 

“Pretty far from town. I don’t see any supplies.” Jack kept his neutral pleasant expression on in the face of the man’s reticence, but when he stepped forward, the man’s hand went to the large gun Carter had noticed at his hip. 

Carter stopped, one hand on his own gun now, but the other hand open and spread to his side. Signaling he wasn’t trying to threaten them. The big man seemed to recognize the gesture; his hand hovered near his weapon but his fingers never touched it. Jack thought he recognized a military bearing to the man. 

Jupiter was wracked with tension. As Entitled, her lack of citizen ship was a non-issue but she still hadn’t learned to be comfortable around police. But she couldn’t let Caine get himself gunned down by some small town lawman. 

“Oh, we are just out for the day,” she said, slipping around Caine. She put a hand on his forearm and he stood down for the moment. Still ready for action, but no longer on the brink. “We were just…” she groped for a logical explanation. “On a hike.”

Jack Carter was not impressed by the poorly told lie. Even if it was possible to just hike into Eureka like any other town, he still wouldn’t have bought it. Jupiter could tell. 

“We stopped to adjust our boots. They… had stones in them.” Damn, Jupiter thought. Its a good thing she kept out of trouble (mostly) or she would have gotten deported years ago. 

 

“Uh-huh. Nice try. I know rocket boots when I see them. I’m going to need you to come back to GD with me where we can sort out what lab those belong to and exactly who is responsible for you two joyriding around in them.”

Caine had tensed again, ready to fight their way out of the situation. It would be simple. Incapacitate the man before them, then use his wings to fly them somewhere more remote to work on repairs. It would be hard taking off from the ground, especially with her extra weight, slight as it may be. But he could manage it for his Queen. 

But Jupiter really wasn’t in the mood to be making more enemies. Especially ones she had just saved from Harvest at great expense to herself. Besides, he hadn’t said anything about arresting them or pressing charges or them having done anything illegal. He seemed more concerned about their boots. Which was a problem in itself but one they might be able to talk their way out of. They could always call Stinger if things got hairy. Plus, she really had to go to the bathroom and was not about to squat behind a tree. So she nodded in agreement.

Jack let them keep the boots on for the hike back to his jeep. They had been bent over the boots when he arrived, poking and prodding. These rocket boots probably weren't any more reliable than the last pair he had encountered. If they worked, these two would have been a far-off speck in the sky by now. No sense making them walk barefoot through the woods.

 

Their first stop on reaching GD was the restroom just off the entry lounge. Carter didn't need the distraction of her distressed dancing when he was trying to decipher GD science-speak. It was a good thing too because security took a while. It was always a long process for visitors and since Jack had never seen either of these two around, he suspected they were not citizens of Eureka. So of course they didn't exist in the GD database. He had Jo digging deeper but in the meantime they would need full scans before they could be allowed in.

 

Jupiter passed through fine, cleared before she even had time to ask if the scan was going to fry her new phone. But Caine was scanned twice and made to stand a few minutes before security finally waved him through. Carter didn’t miss the confusion on their faces. Caine didn’t miss the quiet voice of the one turning away to call his superior.


	2. Chapter 2

"Look, the sooner you tell him how these things work, the sooner we can all get out of here.” The sheriffy part mostly over with, Jack was getting bored with the science Fargo was muttering aloud to no one but himself. 

When they had arrived in the lab, a tech had consulted GD inventory on her tablet but found no records of new personal propulsion prototypes. She waved a scanning device over Jupiter’s feet, frowning at the readings displayed on her tablet before repeating the test on Caine’s boots. Abruptly she scurried away and returned with a tray of instruments that reminded Jack of props from a sci-fi B-movie. Caine and Jupiter didn't bat an eyelash at the odd array. 

The instruments passed fast and furious around their feet, and some over the rest of their bodies. One probe stiffly prodded the side of Jupiter's heel and she had danced away a step with an startled exclamation of “hey!”. But the pretty scientist had offered a smile of apology despite her obvious distraction with the reading her tests had produced. She tapped furiously at the tablet in her hands, head bowed, and didn’t acknowledge them for several moments. Just as she lifted her head to speak, GD Director Douglas Fargo entered the lab and hailed a greeting. 

The lab tech had shoved the tablet into his hands immediately and he quickly absorbed the information. His eyes grew wide and feverish and then he was off. Gathering more instruments around the lab, bending over the benches to fine tune them, re-calibrating computers for fresh readings, insisting the two remove their boots so proper testing could be done without discomfort to them. That was the last coherent thing Jack had caught before it all started going over his head. He had better things to do than stand around feeling stupid. Like figure out who these two were and how they got access to GD technology despite having no credentials that Eureka recognized. 

Jupiter sighed. This was going on long enough. Clearly these people weren't going to let their scientific curiosity go and she wasn’t sure she could blame them. Jupiter herself was still fascinated by the technology she encountered, pestering Stinger and various Aegis crew-members with questions about how everything worked, how and when it had been discovered. It was all fascinating, if not necessarily good to let the average Earth citizen get their hands on. But if things got completely out of hand, the Keeper could come wipe everyone's memories, no harm done. 

“It redirects gravity with differential equations.” She was surprised she remembered that much, given everything that went down immediately after Caine had explained. He certainly wasn't going to explain now, and his attitude coupled with his imposing form has dissuaded anyone from questioning him. “That’s all I really understand of it. Sorry I can’t tell you more."

This prompted a frenzied outburst of muttering from Fargo but between the speed of his rambles and the heavy science talk, the others couldn't follow it. Caine’s sharp ears caught a few things like “fermionics” and “adapting the power source”. These Tersies were more advanced than his briefings on Earth had led him to believe, some of their technology looked adaptable to his own. But he and Jupiter had remained silent about the controls within the gloves they wore, so these humans wouldn’t be able to access any of the boot controls. 

Carter excused himself when GD head of security Jo Lupo entered the lab and crossed to the door to speak with her. He could tell from his former deputy's face something was up. 

“Carter, where did you find these people?” Her voice was hushed but urgent. “This guy is impossible.”

“In the woods. Claimed they were hiking. What do you mean ‘impossible’?” 

“I mean, he is like nothing we’ve ever seen. And we’ve seen a lot. He has technology embedded into him, some kind of device in his head. In the auditory areas so we assume for communication but its so advanced we cant even detect a power source. Also in his shoulder and on his back which seem to support the wing prosthesis the imaging scanners picked up” As she spoke she pointed out the anomalies on the scan that displayed on her tablet. 

“Wings?” Jack was dumbfounded. What wings?

“Carter. Did you even LOOK at the guy when you picked him up?” her tone was impatient with exasperation. 

Turning now, Carter wondered why he hadn’t noticed the man’s long coat despite the fair weather or the slight hump on his back beneath it. Granted, it wasn’t that large. Carter had known men muscular or fat enough to fit a coat kinda like that. It didn't say much for the state of his observational powers today. But still, on what planet would he ever suspect the man was hiding wings? Jack counted himself lucky there hadn’t been weapons concealed there instead. 

“That's like the least weird thing about him too.” Jo continued. “They had to scan him twice because his DNA was failing to register. The other stuff could be dismissed as experimental technology or body mod at a stretch. His extremely dense bone structure is within the limits of a possible human mutation. But he doesn’t register as human in our system and no one on the planet is even near that level of DNA research.”

The word ‘planet’ caught Carter’s attention.

“So what are you saying? Aliens?” he asked. Not really serious, but in Eureka you never know. 

“I thought we were done crying wolf on that one after the mysterious incoming alien signal turned out to be the ship Henry designed, with a Kim clone aboard. Its never aliens. Just some new Eureka weirdness we haven’t encountered yet.” Lupo sounded pretty sure about that.

“And before you ask,” she added to forestall him, “we’ve got no ideas. Yet."

“Fantastic.” he said sarcastically. 

 

 

The woman who approached Jupiter reminded her a bit of herself. Their dark hair was similar in color and both wore it pulled back in a sleek ponytail. They’d probably be about the same height if the other wasn't in heels. But she looked more Italian than Russian, and her smart suit contrasted sharply with Jupiter’s jeans and flannel. That thought made her wonder what Caine must look like to them. His clothing was simple enough to pass on earth but had a decidedly uniform-y look to it. Paired with his weapons, his muscles, and the coat (which she couldn't even make tasteless Trenchcoat Mafia jokes about because he wouldn't get them) he was definitely intimidating. She hoped the sheriff didn't read a threat into that. 

“Hi there, I’m Jo Lupo. I’m head of security at GD.” She offered her hand. The woman who had given Carter the name of Jupiter Jones had taken it for a tentative shake. The man beside her stood at parade rest beside her and didn’t acknowledge the gesture. This one called himself Caine Wise

Making this mystery man even more of an enigma, they couldn't find him in the system. Not a single ping anywhere. Miss Jones had a few but not in the places one would expect. Carter knew a non-citizen when he saw the paper trail but wasn’t interested in enforcing ridiculous immigration laws on young girls. But it was natural for the girl to be wary around police so it was decided that Jo should be the one to show them the hospitality Eureka had to offer. And also chat them up for some information. She had a lot of questions herself so for once she didn't mind playing diplomat/babysitter. 

“Don’t worry, you’re not in any sort of trouble.” Jo set aside her professional tone for some friendly reassurance. "The sheriff thought your boots had been stolen from one of the research labs here at Global Dynamics. The company is kind of a think tank for coming up with new technology and, well, stolen flying boots is a thing that has happened to us before. If you can believe it.”

Jupiter blinked. This Jo Lupo had said flying boots with such casualness. Like it wasn’t even the most impressive thing she saw before breakfast. Maybe Earth wasn’t so far behind the rest of the universe as Jupiter had believed? The gap still seemed immense, and clearly the general public was even further behind.

“But obviously these boots don't match our specs,” Miss Lupo reassured them. “It was an unfortunate mistake on the sheriff’s part. We apologize for any inconvenience and would like to offer a little hospitality while you’re in town.”

 

“Oh, well, we really-“ Jupiter tried to protest.

“Come on.” Jo tried out the persuasive manner she had to use more as head of GD than she ever had as deputy. As deputy she could just crack skulls when she needed something done. “Look, it seems like your flying boots are out of commission. GD has the best tools in town for fixing them and plenty of scientists who would be happy to help. In the meantime our cafe has a 5-star gourmet chef who will make you anything in the world you could possibly want. I mean literally anything.”

Jupiter’s stomach grumbled audibly at that. It had been hours since they had left Chicago and they hadn’t landed for food, planning to find a seafood shack when they hit the west coast. Lupo smiled.

“We even have a spa.” She dialed up the persuasion, sensing Miss Jones was about to capitulate. “Massages, pedicures, exclusive facial treatments available only from GD. Our treat.” 

“Well…” A little pampering did sound nice to Jupiter. If they were stuck here anyway, why not take advantage of it? 

“Great!” Jo didn’t need an answer to know she had won. “Why don’t you come with me to my office first and we’ll see about finding you some footwear. We look about the same size.” she said, glancing down at Jupiter’s feet, clad only in mismatched socks. Her eyes shifted over to Caine’s large feet and long bare toes. “You are going to be more difficult to fit. We can get a custom job going in one of the production labs but it will take some time. Till then why don't i take care of Miss Jones her and show her around. Sheriff Carter will bring you to the cafe to meet us when you’re ready.”

Caine stepped forward when Jo turned to guide Jupiter from the room. So far he hadn’t detected any serious threats to Jupiter’s safety. These humans had given them respectable treatment, maintained an easy distance, and his scanners detected no weapons or devices he couldn't disable with his own tech. Still, he didn’t like the idea of being separated. 

Lupo could respect that but she needed information and she wasn’t going to get it out of the girl when Jupiter was looking to Caine for guidance before each sentence. And Eureka was no threat to either of them if they were no threat to Eureka. There was no reason this couldn’t work out to be mutual beneficial to both sides: GD got a few hours to play with some shiny new tech, and the couple got a nice relaxing day out on the town with access to resort-level amenities. 

“Oh, here,” she said, as if just now remembering the two PDAs in her pocket. She pulled them out, handing one to Jupiter and one to Caine. “Your cell phones wont work in town. We’re on a secure network. But these will let you contact each other and anyone else may need to get in touch with.” Lupo didn’t want the big man’s posse to swoop down on the town in search of the wayward two. “You can even video chat and access the internet; everything streams instantly, no buffering, no dropped calls. Best smartphone you’ll ever use.” 

The gesture seemed to reassure him somewhat. It sure pleased the girl who immediately began poking intently at the small device. 

Jupiter always had get her smartphones secondhand and two years out of date. But this baby the public wouldn’t get their hands on for at least another decade, if she guessed correctly. It was going to be hard not to rudely ignore the other woman in favor of exploring the device. But she made the effort by tucking the tiny phone in her back pocket. Before they left she reassured Caine with a smile. 

“I’ll be fine. I’ll see you later.” He nodded in response but his eyes warned her to be careful. She patted his forearm and nodded back. “Check in in an hour if i don’t see you by then?”

She asked but they both knew it wasn’t a question. 

The first rule they had instituted for her protection when he and Stinger were official appointed to Her Majesty’s royal guard was hourly check ins with reports of her whereabouts and who was with her whenever Jupiter refused a personal bodyguard. She had objected to the invasion of her privacy but Stinger had patiently explained to her it was simply data, information for them to add to their calculations. Her Majesty would owe no one any explanations for her actions, never have to explain why she went somewhere or justify who she kept company with. There would be no judgements, no one in the universe could hope to stop her from doing exactly as she pleased, wherever she pleased, with whomever she pleased. They needed to know only to keep abreast of any situation she might encounter. A farmer must remain constantly updated on the state of the weather to best tend his crops and while Jupiter resented being compared his cornfields she got his point. 

Caine trusted that Jupiter understood all measures taken for her safety and took that seriously. He wasn’t happy to watch her walk out of the room without him. But his sixth sense didn’t make his skin crawl and his hair stand on end the second she left his sight, nor even when her scent finally drifted out of range in the sterile laboratory halls. She was safe enough and nothing here could keep him from her if that changed. He still wasn’t happy she wasn’t at his side… but she was safe.


End file.
